Edin Dzeko's English may be a touch tentative, but his use of rhetoric in a
foreign tongue is already pitch-perfect.

You would anticipate that a man raised in the turmoil of a divided Yugoslavia should have little trouble grasping local politics in the Republic of Mancunia, and so it transpired when the Bosnian seized the stage of his unveiling in sky blue to declare: "Most of the people from Manchester are Manchester City fans."

Whoever machine-tooled that mischievous little sound-bite could be allowed a flush of satisfaction. It was like the Carlos Tévez poster saga all over again. In one silky stroke, Dzeko had redrawn the Tévez banner of "Welcome to Manchester" in his own terms, feeding ammunition to all those who enjoy lampooning Manchester United's travelling band with chants of "You only live 'round the corner."

Naturally, United's retort is withering and emphatic: that more of their season-ticket holders live in Manchester postcodes than City's, that an Old Trafford crowd for a dismal Carling Cup match would eclipse the Eastlands equivalent even on a good day, that their rivals have won nothing since Elvis Presley died. At a time when the two clubs' duel for Premier League supremacy is doing more for their city's profile than Oasis managed, Dzeko's broadside helps sharpen the demarcation between red and blue.

A quick learner, conversant in four languages, Dzeko knew how to turn his press conference into a command performance. Nursing a mug of Horlick's to accentuate his folksy charm, he imbued his words with a faux sincerity, presumably to gloss over their preposterous content. Were we honestly expected to believe that the 24 year-old, while agitating for his £27 million move from Wolfsburg, had learned where Manchester was, let alone studied its pop culture or its ancient sporting enmities?

But listening to him, you would have thought his arrival had brought the realisation of a childhood fantasy. It is difficult to see Bosnia's state television being sustained by reruns of Coronation Street, in the same way it is a stretch to imagine Sarajevo's Aqua Disco advertising its swimming pool parties with Boddington's on tap. Dzeko, though, merely confirmed the golden rule for how to act on your first day at a new club: that it is not what you say, but how you say it.

We understand from a few background checks that he grew up supporting AC Milan. Do not suppose for a second that this is any barrier to acceptance in his adopted land. Let us listen, by way of proof, to Robbie Keane's little peroration upon joining Liverpool in July 2008: "I've been a Liverpool fan all my life. Going back to when I was a kid in Dublin, I always had a Liverpool shirt on my back."

Here is the striker again, last February, this time in green-and-white hoops: "It's no secret that over the years I've been a Celtic fan. I always wanted to play for Celtic."

I have heard about having Catholic tastes, but even for an Irishman, Keane's eclecticism was extreme. Footballers, it seems, like to borrow straight from the politicians' manual in their reptilian changing of colours.

Alternatively, they just appeal to our emotional weakness for tales of boys done good, as Alan Shearer proved in depicting his 1996 transfer to Newcastle United as the selfless embracing of his roots. Of course, the slight problem was his weekly wage of £35,000, roughly the same figure as a terraced house in Newcastle's Kenton suburb would then have fetched.

Shearer was undaunted, mounting a makeshift platform outside the Gallowgate to remind his disciples, in that famous monotone: "I'm just a sheet-metal worker's son from Newcastle." And the crowd went wild.

Still, it had to be an improvement on Tony Blair's dewy-eyed reminiscence about his days watching Jackie Milburn at St James' Park. Yes, this would be the same Milburn who left Newcastle in 1957, when our budding Prime Minister was only four. But the gold standard in this theatre of the absurd belongs to Christian Gross, who cemented his reputation as the game's answer to Wile E Coyote by walking into his official presentation as Tottenham manager clutching a used Tube ticket.

Having mangled the stadium's name as "White Lane Hart," the hapless Swiss intoned: "I hope it will be the ticket of my dreams. I came on public transport because I wanted to experience how the fans feel." Perhaps Dzeko, as he boards his first Mancunian tram, should take heed. There are pitfalls in posturing as a man of the people.